Glass Transition
by TrainScribbler
Summary: With his foremost companion being his own neuroses, life (and death) for Arnold Rimmer is becoming pretty unbearable. But then four inches of glass can make a big difference... Rimmer/OC
1. Chapter 1

**Writer's block has put Einherjar on a big hold for me, maybe until the next Thor movie *squirm* So I decided to revisit an old idea for a Red Dwarf fic I had as a teenager. Yes, I know this thing has been done to death, but hey, I'm doing it again, basically because I enjoy it hehe. Please R+R guys, they keep me going. And please try to enjoy :)**

* * *

Arnold Judas Rimmer watched his bunkmate pensively as the latter glugged back a nondescript grey can of watery lager while flicking through an old Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition, sprawled on his bunk. He felt his nostrils twitch.

_Git._

"Lister, it is four o'clock in the afternoon, if you lie in that position much longer you are going to develop bed sores," the hologram said in exasperation, hooking his thumbs into his belt loops. "At which point I shall be forced to ask Kryten to flip you firmly off your backside, scrub you down with emollient and cart you off to quarantine simply so we don't have to endure the stench that will waft so exuberantly from the grubby little pustules."

Lister slowly sloped his gaze up from Izabel Goulart's striking paisley number, circa early 21st century, and up to meet Rimmer's own, his mulatto features breaking into an irritatingly warm smile.

"Sorry, is there something' you wanted?" came the scouse drawl as he poked the fur rimmed front of his hat up an inch or so. Rimmer let out a sigh, turning to pace in a neat circle, clasping his hands behind his back.

"Just think of what you could be doing with this time, Listy! You should be using it to better yourself, levering yourself ever higher, reaching for great things…"

"I am," Lister replied with a chuckle, waving the magazine briefly. Rimmer paused, doing a quarter turn on his heel to look up at his one and only subordinate, however loosely that term could be applied.

"You do realise you are the last human being alive?" he said, annunciating slowly. "Don't you see what a responsibility that is? Supposing we run across aliens, hm? Think of the impression you'd make!" Straightening, the hologram scrunched his face, bucking out his upper teeth and said in a reedy Liverpudlian accent;

"Ey man, ow's it hangin'? My name's Dave, I'm the last of me kind. Fancy a curry and a cartoon about' monkehs or shall we jus' head straight to the disco and get blammo?!"

Lister rolled his eyes, flomping over onto his back and raised his dog eared magazine once more.

"Smeg off, Rimmer," he muttered, turning a page, before slowly swivelling it ninety degrees, eyes widening.

"Look, you need to accept the mantle that has been laid upon you!" Rimmer continued, his own pompous manner returning, hands raised in exasperation. "Don't you see? You're the last one! You represent the whole of humanity! Unfortunately… The least you can do is make an effort about it!"

With a groan Dave swivelled in his bunk and sat up, letting his legs dangle over the side, looking coolly down at the other man.

"Meanin'?"

"You have to think about these things! I could help you. Mould you… Make you a better you!"

"Rimmer, lets be honest, we both know personal development isn't your strong point…" Lister said with a smirk, dropping down from the bunk and scratching the back of his neck. The hologram's jaw stiffened and he dropped his arms to his side.

"This coming from the man who considers the invention of the beer milkshake a point to enhance his CV…" he replied coolly.

"Ey, that drink is legendary! Only reason it's not taken off is cos there's no-one around to appreciate it…" Lister shook his head, bending down to scoop a pair of bedraggled black trousers from the floor, hopping on one foot as he put them on.

"What's brought all this on, anyway?" he said between bounces. "Last time you were talkin' like this it was before your exams and it was all 'Up and away Arnie, ziggurat, lickety-smeggin'-split, F-I-S-H…"

Rimmer's expression darkened for a moment, the grip of his interlaced fingers tightening.

"I just though it might be better you did something with your time other than steeling yourself for the next big slobathon," he murmured, only half meaning it.

"Rimmer, it's been two years, give it up, man," Lister replied as he jerked his fly up. "Not everyone wants to be as socially constipated as you."

"Fine!" snapped the hologram, drawing himself to his full height and clicking his heels together. "Just don't come crying to me when we're caught in the scoop of superior beings who hold about as much regard for you as the sole member of the human race as they would a toasted blue cheese and Mycota powder sandwich."

"Don't worry, man," Lister replied with a grin, tugging his dreads over his shoulder with a smirk. "No one with a sane mind would come runnin' to you." With that he touched the light pad for the door and exited the sleeping quarters with a chuckle, retrieving a cigarette from behind his ear as he did, the swimwear magazine tucked under his arm.

Once he could no longer hear the footsteps, Rimmer sank onto his bottom bunk with a dejected sigh. The truth was he sincerely had hoped he could inspire his goit of a bunkmate. He needed a project, something to keep his mind intact and clear of the threat of incredible, insanity inducing boredom. Having just, unbeknownst to Lister, failed his astro-navs again for the tenth time on the trot, he had to give the lout credit where it was due; he -was- useless at personal development. It was time to seriously consider cutting his losses and focus on something new. If he couldn't achieve officerhood he could at least attempt to scrape his companion off the rung of the evolutionary ladder shared only by him, plankton and some particularly stupid krill…

Rimmer shook his head slowly, running a hand through his unruly hair, grinding his teeth briefly. He was in Hell. A touchless, sensationless, curry scented Hell. He could feel the cracking point on the horizon. If something didn't change soon he might just have to give in and admit defeat to his father. Smeg.

Sinking back onto the bunk he stared blankly at the bottom of the one above, the stupid headline clippings plastered on the wall in the periphery of his vision, only serving to increase his frustration. Letting his mind wander, he idly half hoped that aliens would have the good grace to come by and turn Lister into a string of sausages…

"Alert, alert, puce alert. We have an alerting situation occurring. Alert. Alert."

Holly's monotonous tone snapped Rimmer from his reverie and he jerked upright, the mirror above the sink shifting to display the balding visage of the ship's supposedly brilliant computer.

"Puce alert?" Rimmer said with an arched eyebrow, getting to his feet. "Since when did we have a puce alert?"

"Since we ran out of the little red light bulbs, Arnold," the computer replied flatly. "There's a situation down in the cargo bay. The scoop system picked up some debris, dumped it in the hangar. Kryten's already on his way."

"Space debris?" Rimmer repeated, hands on hip. "And this warranted a full alert?"

"Well, I thought you ought to know, being as it's got a JMC insignia plastered on the side. Shall I just flush it back out then?"

The hologram sighed, shaking his head.

"No, not yet. Though I'm willing to bet ten dollarpounds it's another smegging garbage pod…"

"Right you are. See you on the deck." Holly's visage faded to black, although the sounds of the droning alert message could still be heard throughout the ship. Rimmer turned to the door, saying briskly;

"Open."

With a soft swish the sheet of metal slid to one side and he strode down the maze of corridors, chewing the inside of his cheek all the way. Best not to open his mouth this time, certainly not in front of Lister…

* * *

"Are you sure, Kryters?"

Lister stood bowed over the massive object, nose so close it was almost touching the surface. It was around eight foot long and four foot deep, made of metal that was blackened and buffeted from it's journey through space, though there it was clear enough slapped across the top and sides; JMC.

"Quite sure, sir," said the mechanoid, watching the skutters circle the crate, a scanner clutched in his hand. "It is hollow. And there are distinct energy signatures being emitted, albeit very faint ones. There is something inside."

"What do you reckon it is?" Lister asked, rapping his knuckles on the top a couple of times.

"Difficult to say without opening it, sir," Kryten said, cocking his angular head. "The casing is extremely dense, I cannot penetrate it with the scanner's signal to gather further data."

"S'pose we best pop the lid then, ey Krytie?" Lister grinned, rubbing his hands together gleefully for a moment before running his fingers over the object's surface looking for a seam.

"Sir, with all due respect, do you think that wise?" the droid said nervously, taking a step back. "Who knows what could be in there?"

"I'm inclined to agree with Kryten here, Lister." Rimmer's clipped tones echoed through the cargo bay, causing Lister to bite his tongue for a moment before straightening up to look at his holographic shipmate.

"Ship's protocol," Rimmer continued, "is that all unknown objects of interest are to be confined to the quarantine suite until further notice."

"Rimmer, it's a smegging JMC pod. It's probably just the post!"

"Be that as it may, rules are rules, Listy. The last thing we wants is you developing some lovely little spaceborn disease, perhaps, oh I don't know, radioactive necrotising faciitis?" Rimmer stood beside the hunk of metal, leaning in to smirk at his companion, rocking on the balls of his feet. Lister tutted, before stepping back, hands falling limply to his sides.

"Fine. Let's get it on a hover-pad, lug it up to quarantine…."

* * *

Lister and Cat stood shoulder to shoulder, watching Kryten in anticipation, occasionally murmuring to one another, Lister rapping his knuckles on the glass at one point and gesticulating to the mechanoid to hurry up.

Rimmer lingered behind then, arms crossed over his chest, utterly silent. His curiosity was aroused by the contents of the crate, he had to admit, but he wasn't going to vocalise it. After his altercation with Lister the last thing he needed was more ribbing. He just wanted the business to be done with, then he could have another go at smegging up his Esperanto revision…

The minutes ticked over, leading into an hour, then a second. At one point the others got bored and wandered off to find the nearest vending machine, leaving the hologram a chance to draw closer to the quarantine bay window, leaning forwards to peer inside. The skutters had cut through the seals of whatever the thing was and Kryten was equalizing the pressure with that of the ship. It had to be soon.

"Hey, Goal-Post-Head, you're blockin' the view!"

The Cat's yowl in his ear made Rimmer flinch and he almost lunged forwards right through the wall. Checking himself, he half stepped, half fell to the side, scowling as the others took residence on some deckchairs they'd dug up, Lister resting his feet on the rim of the window.

"This'd better be worth it," he said, taking a noisy slurp from the plastic teacup in his hand. "At least, it better not be last week's roast dinner again." He shot a mischievous glance over his shoulder at Rimmer and the hologram could feel a metaphysical muscle twitch in his jaw.

"Man, this show is boring!" came a thin whine from the Cat. "Can't we change the channel?"

"Shut up, Smeg-for-Brains!" Rimmer spat, eyes fixated on the inside of the room. "Look, Kryten's got it open…"

Sure enough, inside the mech was heaving off the enormous lid to whatever it was, a small bleep signalling the com-link between within the room and without activating as it went crashing to the ground. The impact reverberated through the floor, a burst of white smoke- wait, smoke, or steam?- swallowed the room, before a few moments later the droid could be heard saying softly,

"Oh, my…"

Dave leapt from his seat, forehead pressed to the window, palms too, his cup clattering to the floor.

"What is it, Krytes?!"

"It's… it's… a human, sir…"

Rimmer jerked forwards, reaching to join Lister against the glass, then swearing as his brain caught up a moment later to remind him he couldn't.

"What do you mean, 'it's a human,' Kryten?" he barked.

"Exactly that, sir…"

He was sounding more and more confused by the second. The opaque cloud that had filled the room was beginning to clear and the misty shape of the droid came into view, slowly followed by the now open pod. Sure enough, there it was, plain as day; the unmistakable form of another human being, covered in layers of grime and soot and what appeared to be a film of frost. There was a clear blue sheen emerging between the cakes of dirt, the casket giving off a faint ticking sound as it warmed.

"Cryostasis…" murmured Rimmer in awe. "That technology was outdated before I was even born… Kryten, are they alive?"

"I don't know, Mister Rimmer, sir," fumbled the droid as he swept the scanner over the frozen newcomer. "I have never seen anything like this. The chemical readings coming from this chamber are pure nonsense!"

The hologram risked a glance at the others, who looked back at him slowly, jaws slack.

"You see?" he said smugly. "Quarantine protocol. Feel free to thank me later."

"Mister Rimmer! Mister Rimmer sir!" Kryten's voice was becoming steadily more frantic. Rimmer snapped his gaze back, arching onto his toes to try and get a better look.

"What is it, Kryten?"

"I've found a pulse, Mister Rimmer! She's alive!"

A jubilant whoop exploded from Lister, who then punched the Cat square in the shoulder.

"Did you hear that?! There's a human bein' in there! A real one! One hundred percent, home grown, human bein'! I'm not the only one!" Throwing his fist into the air while his victim bared his fangs at him, he was about to leap into another barrage of celebration, when what Kryten had said caught him midway.

"Wait, did you just say 'she'?" he said slowly, eyes becoming the size of dinner plates.

"Yes, Mister Lister, sir. According to my readings, this is a female." Kryten gently took the limp wrist that was crossed over the defrosting woman's chest, nodding his head for a few moments as he counted to himself. "Returning to the land of the living as we speak."

"Oh my God… Oh my God! Yes! Yes!" Lister whirled around the spot, dreadlocks flying, the Cat leaping out of his path with a yelp. "Did you hear that, Rimmer? Not only a human bein' but a female! A bonafide -woman-! It must be my birthday!"

Rimmer felt his tachyonic heart sink inside his chest as he stared into the room once more. This was it. It was all over. Lister would be beyond insufferable now, he'd be -happy-. In a moment of quiet reflection he decided it might be a good thing that he was incapable of touching things otherwise he might just had to of gone ahead and flushed himself out of an airlock…

Beside him Lister was still dancing like an inane idiot as Kryten stood to approach the window, blocking his view of the casket, holding up the medi-scanner so that he could read it.

"No immediate signs of contagion, sir. Some minor cellular damage to the outermost epidermis but major organ function seems to remain intact. Recommended minimum quarantine period; six weeks."

Rimmer nodded slowly, though most of it went in one ear and out the other. There was another human being in there…

"Oooooh, I'm in the mooooood for dancin', romancin'-"

"SHUT UP, LISTER! JUST SHUT UP!"

"Well, what the smeg is your problem, Captain Moodkill-"

The sound of someone being very noisily sick erupted over the speaker.

Silence descended upon them. Teeteringly slow, Kryten turned aside to stare at the pod, it's occupant revealed hanging over the side of it, straggly hair clinging to her face as she raised her gaze, eyes bloodshot and streaming, her last meal splattered all over the floor.

"Smeg…" murmured Rimmer.


	2. Chapter 2

**Hullo, here we are, have another chapter, I hope you like it :) Oh and apologies for any typos, I was very sleepy when I wrote this .  
**

* * *

Rimmer paced the corridor, brow furrowed as Lister stood outside the quarantine bay window, his gaze intent. He could hear Kryten's voice echoing over the comm-system;

"Beginning primary decontamination processes now, sir. This will take some time."

There was a small noise of annoyance from Lister as the glass became opaque, shielding those inside from view. He fell back into his chair, one hand resting on the back of his head as he reclined, his face still lit with anticipation. The cat had evacuated some time ago, the sight of vomit causing a rushed exit.

"Ey, Rimmer? Rimmer, man?"

The hologram turned to look at him, steps pausing, feeling his molars click together a couple of times before he replied.

"What?"

"You said that pod was pretty old, right?"

"I suspect so." Rimmer took a few steps forwards to stand next to his bunkmate, looking down at him. "Cryostasis was eradicated by the middle of the twenty second century in favour of stasis in time. It was a lot safer. All the booths were supposed to have been decommissioned…"

The sound of a high pressure hiss came over the speaker above their heads.

Lister turned back to look at the pane of silver before him, drumming his fingers on his thigh.

"So she could'a been out there a while, then?" he said, his voice lower than before.

"It's possible."

"Do you think she knows?"

"Knows wha-"

A high pitched scream sliced through the air, the sound distorted as the speaker whined to transition it. Lister leapt from his seat, covering his ears with the heels of his hands.

"Kryten! What the smeg is goin' on?!"

Rimmer winced as a second wail filled the air, one foot creeping behind as he slowly withdrew.

"Kryten!"

There was an abundant air of struggle in the droid's voice as the reply came, along with the odd grunt and an increasing hiss, the sound of water under immense pressure.

"Do not be alarmed, Mister Lister, sir, I am not harming her," he called, an 'oof' sound following. "She is quite strong!"

"Blimey, it sounds like you're tryin' to kill her in there, man!" Lister pulled his hat off roughly, anxiety creeping over his face in deep lines. He shot a glare back at the hologram, who sucked his teeth for a moment before saying sharply;

"Don't give me that! It had to be done. It could very well be saving her life, and yours!"

Another scream pealed overhead and Rimmer felt his hand involuntarily creeping to his mouth as it led to guttural sobs and choked coughs, then something that couldn't be seen slammed into the window. Kryten was trying to coerce his way around the stranger, all the while rambling;

"I'm sorry, ma'am, truly I am, please hold still, ma'am, you'll slip…"

Lister waved a hand up at the speaker, scowling angrily at his companion.

"Can you hear that? Are you happy now, you slimy, egotistical git?"

Rimmer shook his head, just a fraction, stepping back again as one of the shrieks cracked and gave way to indiscernible pleading.

"Holly, turn it off," he stammered. "Turn the sound -off-."

Abruptly the terrible noise was cut, leaving an unpleasant low whooshing in his ears in it's absence.

"I hope you're pleased with yerself," Lister declared, rounding on him dangerously.

"Don't start, Lister," the dead technician replied, pointing a wavering finger at him. "You know I'm right." He closed his hand into a fist, snapping it tightly to his side and marched away down the corridor before anyone could stop him, feeling sick, Dave staring at the empty space he left incredulously.

He wasn't pleased with himself. He had endured the decontamination processing once, after a wrong turn down an alleyway on Mimas led him into the path of an overflowing cesspit, much to Hollister's obvious delight. The burning de-parasitic powder, the water so hot and so hard you thought it would strip flesh from bone, the brutal, invasive scrubbing with stinking iodine solution…

He wasn't pleased with himself at all. But the woman, and shamefully Lister, were precious cargo. It had to be done.

* * *

Several hours later when Lister retreated to their room, Rimmer pretended to be asleep, his face to the wall. He listened to the angry utterances still coming from the other man as he climbed into the bed above, falling into it heavily and causing it to give a moan. For several minutes they lay in the quiet and the dark, until Lister broke the silence, his voice soft;

"Kryten had to sedate her. There's a lot of stuff in her bloodstream apparently, cryoprotectants or sumthin'. It's making her really sick. He's not sure she'll come through the night…"

Rimmer stared at the matte grey wall, swallowing once.

"The only other human bein' in three million years and she could be dead by mornin…" the voice above continued. "This is worse than terrible."

Unable to squeeze any words past the uncomfortable lump in his throat, Rimmer rolled onto his back, hands clasped over his stomach. He had to of done the right thing. He just had to of.

* * *

Deep below them, Kryten stood watchfully over the unconscious woman, gently brushing her hair into a fan over the pillow beneath her head in a maternal fashion. Every couple of seconds a low beep sounded from a screen above her head, an electric blue dot of light pinging into being, sliding across the screen, then vanishing again each time.

* * *

When Rimmer awoke the next morning he was alone once more, Lister surprisingly having vacated his bed before him. He sat up onto the side of the mattress slowly, resting his elbows on his thighs, steepled fingertips lightly touching his bottom lip.

No one had been to wake him. Which meant one of two things; good news or bad news.

"Holly, uniform," he muttered, getting to his feet with a low sigh, feeling a small surge as his appearance changed. He really didn't want to leave this room and face Lister's accusing stares again. He just didn't seem to understand, he was trying to be the good guy.

Steeling himself, he commanded the door open, trudging his way to the mess. Stopping at the doorway to peer inside he found it empty, their table clear. Quirking an eyebrow he turned about again, his pace picking up as he headed for the red railed stairs that lead to the quarantine deck, walking first, then breaking into a trot.

As he reached the corridor he saw Lister and the Cat stood outside the woman's window, Lister with his hand on his hips, his face torn between fear and perplexion. The Cat was staring too, and Rimmer heard him say loudly,

"Man, she is one crazy cuckoo bird!"

He started running then, skittering up to them and looking eagerly though the window.

"Is she alive? Where is she?" he panted, swaying one way then the other trying to see the woman. At first the room looked empty and he felt a sensation akin to his stomach dropping. Beside him Lister tapped on the window twice, then pointed to the far left.

"There," he said, shaking his head. "Kryten left to sluice himself off in another decontamination shower just over an hour ago. He said she suddenly shot over there at about four o'clock in the morning and hasn't budged since. Almost blew his head off from the shock. She just suddenly woke up.."

"I don't see anything," Rimmer huffed, leaning further, "are you sure she's- oh…"

Tucked right in the furthest reach of the fore left corner, only just visible in the periphery of his vision, sat the woman. She was dressed in a pale blue and papery hospital gown, her legs pulled right up into her chest with her arms crossed over them, face buried in her knees, creamy blonde hair falling in a smooth curtain to her shoulders. Her exposed shins and forearms were smudged with bruises and a melolin dressing was tacked to the inside of her left calf. She was rocking back and forth slowly, fingers blanched as she clutched herself tightly.

Rimmer slowly slid his attention to Lister, asking in a whisper,

"Has she been doing this all morning?"

"Yeah. That's not the worst bit though. Listen to this." Dave looked up at the speaker above their heads, raising his voice. "Holly, could ye turn the sound on?"

"Right you are."

There was a moment of feedback and Rimmer straightened up, listening eagerly for a few moments, then frowned.

"I don't hear anything," he said, slipping one hand into his pocket.

"Wait for it," Lister replied. "Holly, increase the volume would ye?"

Another whistle came from the speaker as it adjusted and Rimmer cocked his head towards it. Lister held up an index finger, whispering;

"Listen now. Really carefully."

After a few moments the hologram became aware of a low muttering, something rhythmic and repetitive.

"What is that?" he asked, a deep crease appearing in his brow either side of the residing H.

"Just wait for it," Lister said again, then turned to the window and raising his voice, called to the occupant inside;

"How are ye feeling then?"

"Thorne. A. February eighteenth, twenty one zero niner. L. T. Four. Four. Two. Niner. J. M. C. Andromeda. Three. Niner. One. Seven."

Rimmer jumped at the sudden burst of sound from the woman. She didn't move at all save for the steady to and fro rocking, and her voice was hoarse and cracked, but there it was, clear as a bell.

"She does that every time I try to talk to her," Lister said, rubbing his cheek. "It goes on for a bit and then it all goes quiet again. I think she's cracked."

Rimmer tilted his head as he watched the woman sway, curling his tongue as he listened to her repeating the same odd sequence over and over.

"Thorne. A. February eighteenth, twenty one zero niner. L. T. Four. Four. Two. Niner. J. M. C. Andromeda. Three. Niner. One. Seven. Thorne. A. February eighteenth, twenty one zero niner. L. T. Four. Four. Two. Niner. J. M. C. Andromeda. Three. Niner. One. Seven. Thorne. A. February-"

"Good God, I know what that is!" he cried suddenly, turning to look at Lister with widened eyes.

"Wha?"

"Listen to her, you baboon brained lump of lard! It's a service number!" The hologram turned to the window again, wrinkling his nose as he listened. "That's a name. And then most likely date of birth. Then her service number and her ship. She's using the code of conduct for prisoners of war…"

Lister arched his brow, staring into the room again at the hunkered form.

"She thinks she's a prisoner?" he mumbled. "Smeg, Rimmer, what have you done?"

"I haven't done anything!" Rimmer shot back, incredulous. "It's standard procedure! Hostage situations, POWs, that sort of thing. Bog standard Space Corps training. Not that it usually amounts to anything. You use your name and identification to hold it together." He paused, listening again, tapping a finger on his temple.

"Thorne. A. February eighteenth, twenty one zero niner. L. T. Four. Four. Two. Niner."

"L. T. That could be…" Scrunching up his face, he shook his head, then turned to Lister once more. "It could be her rank. Try calling her lieutenant. Go on!"

Lister cleared his throat, lifting his chin as he called through to the room once more.

"Lieutenant Thorne? Lieutenant Thorne?"

The chanting of the numbers ceased suddenly, followed by the rocking. Holding their collective breath, the three men watched in silence, before the halo of pale hair raise slowly, parting as it did to reveal a snowy face set with round violet eyes that looked up at the glass in terrified wonder, small, pearlique lips parting just a little as she exhaled.

"Ey, it worked! Well look at that, Rimmer, I guess you're not a total gimp," Lister said with a chuckle, giving the girl a jovial wave. She jerked back at this, unflinching as the back of her head thudded lightly on the wall behind. Rimmer stared at her, face expressionless, an odd sensation washing over him as though someone was filling his mouth with cotton wool.

"You're alright, Lieutenant Thorne," came Lister's voice into his ear fuzzily. "You're on the JMC ship Red Dwarf. We're gonna look after you, ok?"

She remained statuesque, watching them carefully. Rimmer blinked slowly a couple of times, then shook his head, frowning. Silently he turned and strode briskly up the corridor without another word, leaving the others to gape after him in bewilderment.

"Hey, what's his problem?" asked the cat, twitching a thumb under his lapel briefly.

"Beats me," Lister replied, tutting. He looked back into the room, the woman inside still unmoving. "Well, this should be fun. Kryters will be over the moon. He was pretty depressed last night by the time he medicated her…"

* * *

Somewhere above them, Rimmer was sliding down the wall to sit on the floor of an abandoned corridor, thinking about how he could have felt better if he'd been hit in the chest by a sledgehammer than he did at that moment. The last woman alive, breathing and tangible, on their ship, right there in front of him, with Lister wafting his hand at her like a jibbering idiot. He wished very much at that moment he was able to emulate her arrival and be violently sick.


	3. Chapter 3

**Thank you so much to those of you sweet enough to stop and review, I'm really glad people are interested in my little ramblings *Happy face* If anyone feels like doing it some more, please do, hehe. They help keep me inspired 3 Also, sorry for the info dump in this chapter, I had to do it at somepoint...**

* * *

Rimmer sat at the small grey table in the sleeping quarters he shared with Lister, arms folded over his chest, staring at his copy of Napoleon's war diaries, a skutter holding it steady.

"Turn," he said glumly. The robot strained and extended it's neck, making a small whirring noise as it did so, the page flipping over. Frowning slightly, he tried to focus, but nothing was going in. He was listening for the sounds of footsteps heralding Lister's return.

Tutting, he swivelled in his seat, looking up at the mirror over the basin.

"Don't," he muttered to himself as he flexed his fingers once, itching to summon the computer's interface. "You'll only regret it."

He lingered for a few moments, then turned back again with a sigh, eyes sliding over the words. He had no idea where he was in the chapter.

The door to the room slid open smoothly a few minutes later, Lister sauntering in. He pulled off his hat, tossing it up onto the top bunk, then flopped down into the spare seat, letting out a lengthy, loud sigh.

"Turn," Rimmer said crisply. The skutter twisted itself again, flipping another page.

"Three days and nothin'," Lister said, rubbing his forehead with his fingertips. "She still won't eat. Kryten tried to put her on a drip but she jus' ripped it out. I keep trying to talk to her, but she jus' sits in that corner, all glazed over. She's even stopped that number stuff now. I don't get it…"

"Indeed, Lister, why would anyone not what to talk to you," Rimmer said, his tone acidic, as he kept his gaze trained on the book. "What with you having all the exceptional social graces of a rabid warthog?"

"I keep tryin' to tell her, 'we're friendlies, you're on a company ship.' She still says nought. I think she's cracked, man. Nothin' but bits of grey fluff rolling around between her ears." Lister leant over to unlace his boots, his holographic companion shuffling to the furthest side of his seat. "I guess I just thought she'd be a bit more grateful, y'know? Can you imagine if the gelf had found her before we did?"

There was a pregnant pause. Then Rimmer said softly,

"Close," allowing the skutter to fold the book shut before he clasped his hands in his lap, a quiet, dangerous mist of anger around him as he turned to look at Dave.

"Have you given -any- consideration to what she might have been through, you empty minded gimp?" he said, watching Lister's eyes widen. "Have you even -heard- of the Andromeda?"

"No," Dave replied, pausing mid lace tug, the black cords dangling between his fingers.

"Well you should have. Ask Holly." With that Rimmer got to his feet, marching out of the room. Lister watched him go with wide eyes, muttering,

"Well 'scuse me for breathin'." He tugged off his boots, throwing them over his shoulder, then looked up at the mirror.

"Come on then, Hol. What's got Molecule Mind's knickers in a twist about this ship?"

The ship's façade faded into being in the glass, his eyes glazed as he rattled off monotonously;

"JMCS Andromeda, launched September the twenty first, the year twenty one thirty two. Crew, two hundred and eighty seven. Research vessel, commission; seek new deposits of platinum group minerals."

"So that was Lieutenant Thorne's ship, then?" Lister asked, leaning his forearms on the table as he sat forwards.

"That's right, Dave," the computer said with a nod.

"What happened to it?"

"No one really knows for sure," Holly said, tilting his head in such a way that it expressed a definite shrug. "It was all a big embarrassment for the Jupiter Mining Corporation. Brand spanking new ship, all the latest gizmos, off on a treasure hunt, then two months into it's maiden voyage, it went missing. There were seventy four cryostasis booths on board, all with built in homing beacons, none of them ever made it back to earth. The only thing that did was the black box, according to that they were all of them released. Something zapped the communication systems on the ship. Lots of theories went round; they found some source of unstable minerals, there was a solar storm, a rival company shot them down. Whatever it was, not a single member of the Andromeda crew ever came home, or was ever accounted for again. The ship and everything in it simply disappeared, somewhere in space. Poof."

"Smeg…" uttered Lister, resting his chin in his hand. "So she's been floating about out there even longer than we have?"

"Looks that way, Dave."

"Oh man. Seventy four pods… Do you reckon there's more of them out there, Holly?"

"Hard to say," replied the computer. "After all, in all that time, what were the odds of us finding the one we did? There's a lot of bugger all out there for them to float around in, not to mention all the swirly whirly space stuff to swallow them up."

"We've got to tell her," Lister said, sinking deeper onto the table. "At some point soon we'll have to. She deserves to know how far she is from home."

"Not it!" Holly said quickly. Lister gave the computer a scowl.

"Too true you're not," he muttered.

* * *

Kryten stood outside the quarantine bay, medi-scan in his hand. Tapping the illuminated buttons, he updated his notes, before looking into the room with a blank expression. On the floor there was a plate of rice and vegetables, a glass of water next to it, both untouched. A drip stand stood beside the empty bunk, the fine plastic tube leading down from the cartridge dangling aimlessly.

"Dear oh dear," he mumbled to himself, looking down to switch the scanner off.

Rimmer hovered at the end of the corridor, watching for a moment before clearing his throat. The droid looked up in his direction, straightening quickly.

"Oh, mister Rimmer, sir."

"How is she, Kryten?"

The mechanoid wandered over to him, shrugging his angular shoulders.

"No futher signs of contaminates, sir. But her mental state is questionable. I don't know what else I can do. She won't eat, she won't move. She is highly uncooperative."

Rimmer bit his bottom lip, glancing over Kryten's shoulder to the illuminated window.

"And she's not said anything new?"

"No, sir. She simply sits there. I am beginning to wonder if I should put her into stasis for her own wellbeing."

The hologram raised a hand, shaking his head once.

"Not yet. Give her a few more days," he said, meeting Kryten's gaze once more.

"But sir, if we don't do something she could become very sick!" Kryten looked up at him wide-eyed.

"Look, why don't you go and find her some proper clothes?" Rimmer said, skirting around his comment.

"Sir, I-"

"Now, Kryten."

The droid opened his mouth, then closed it again, looking like a guppy.

"Yes, sir," he said resolutely, and made his way down the corridor, knees jerking up awkwardly with each step.

Rimmer clasped his hands behind his back, taking a deep breath. He'd avoided the temptation to come back to the quarantine deck since the girl had come out of her trance three days ago and looked up at them. The very thought of her terrified him. He was less than useless with women as it was, but one as fragile as her…

Muttering to himself, he took a few tentative steps towards her window.

"What are you doing, Arnold, you tit…?"

As he reached the bay, he let his hands fall to his side, calling,

"Holly, chair."

A bright blue plastic seat popped into being and he pulled back a couple of feet from the window, sinking into it. Again, on first inspection the room seemed vacant. But a pair of white feet and ankles were just visible, poking out of the left corner.

"Lieutenant Thorne?" he called experimentally, clasping his hands in his lap.

The feet twitched, then pulled back out of sight.

_Smeg, smeg, what the smeg are you smegging doing, Arnold? _

"Lieutenant Thorne, I am Second Technician Arnold J Rimmer."

There was no change in the room.

"That's Rimmer. A. J. Seven four zero four. JMC Red Dwarf. Eight three two four."

_What the smeg are you hoping to accomplish here, you useless waste of tachyons? Since when were you the great smegging neogtiator? You're mad. You're a great, mad, useless goit!_

Four small, pale fingers appeared at the inside window sill. Rimmer jerked back in his seat, mouth open. Painfully slow, the top of a ghostly blonde head followed, then a forehead, then finally two large, deep, violet blue eyes, bloodshot around the irises and shining wetly.

Rimmer swallowed, feeling the familiar painful lump wedging itself in his throat.

"Lieutenant Thorne?" he said again, with gentleness that surprised himself.

A pause.

Then a tiny, tiny nod.

Rimmer froze in his seat. He was stuck now. He met those wide eyes with his own dark ones, then shifted slightly, leaning forwards a few inches, trying to ignore the booming of his own phantom pulse in his ears.

"You're on the ship Red Dwarf, remember? We told you when you woke up?"

Another fractional incline of the head.

"Do you know what has happened to you?" he asked softly. His right knee started to bounce involuntarily.

She shook her head slowly. Once to the left, once to the right.

Rimmer looked away for a moment, trying to gather his thoughts. He was panicking. He rubbed his face, then turned back again. She was still staring at him, just the bridge of her nose up visible.

"You were cryogenically frozen," he said, at a loss for anything else. "But you're with us now. We're going to make sure you're alright…"

_You're so crap at this! Some smegging rescuer you're turning out to be!_

A faint whistle came from the speaker above his head. Rimmer peered up, wrinkling his nose. Then a faint voice came over it, barely discernable;

"The others…"

He looked back down again sharply. She was resting both hands on the windowsill now, gripping it tightly.

"What others?"

He could feel himself getting up, legs leading him blindly to kneel on one knee before the pane of glass, looking down at her levelly.

_Bloody hell, what are you DOING?!_

"Other pods…"

_Oh, Goooood…._

"I- There were no other pods. I'm sorry…"

The eyes closed and a glimmer of light reflected from a fat tear as it slid down her cheek and out of view. Rimmer floundered, looking down at his thighs, a stretched silence sinking between them.

Then;

"Anneke…"

His gaze shot up again. She was looking out at him once more, the fingetips of her left hand resting on the glass.

"It's Anneke Thorne. I'm not a lieutenant anymore…"

Rimmer locked up. He could hear some little voice in the back of his mind, willing him to move, but he couldn't. There were heavy footsteps approaching, clunking on the griddle floor. Kryten was coming back.

With great effort he managed a thin, flustered smile, mumbling,

"You'll be alright," before he scrambled to his feet, face burning. As Kryten turned into the corridor he walked hurriedly towards him, not daring to look back at the window. The droid had some clothing folded in a neat square parcel in his hands.

"Mr Rimmer, sir, I was able to find the-"

"Her name's Anneke," Rimmer said sharply, cutting him off. Kryten looked at him in astonishment, raising a hand, but the hologram simply strode past, hurrying up the stairs to the next deck, mind racing.

_You cannot come down here again. Leave it to Kryten._ _She's fine. Do not try and speak to her again, you total, utter, smeghead…_


	4. Chapter 4

__**Hello again all! Thank you for reading and reviewing, very kind of you. I'm aware that the pace is slowing down a little bit with this now but it kind of has to. I hate that whole 'love all of a sudden' thing, it gets my goat. Especially with a character like Rimmer. I just don't see it happening. Even with Nirvanah Crane, he was still disgusted with himself at the end. Anyway, I digress. Please enjoy, and if you do, say so! ^^  
**

* * *

_This is an SOS distress call from the mining ship Red Dwarf. The crew are dead, killed by a radiation leak. The only survivors were Dave Lister, who was in suspended animation during the disaster, and his pregnant cat, who was safely sealed in the hold. Revived three million years later, Lister's only companions are a life form who evolved from his cat, a service droid found on a derelict ship and Arnold Rimmer, a hologram simulation of one of the dead crew._

_Additional; seven days ago we found a survivor from the JMCS Andromeda. Although confined to quarantine, on the outset she seems fit and well. Dave Lister's morale has significantly improved, though his personal hygiene has yet to follow suit._

* * *

Lister wandered down the corridor towards the drive room, tossing a tennis ball up and down into the air, a can swinging in the pocket of his jacket, a smouldering cigarette hanging from his lip as he smiled warmly to himself. Inside the drive room Rimmer was looking down at the centre module, tapping one foot, scowling in concentration.

"Alright, man?" Lister said, sitting on the screen to block his view. The hologram rolled his eyes, looking up.

"You realise you have the complete guide to spatial vertices betwixt your buttocks, Lister?"

"Really? I didn't feel a thing," Lister said with a grin.

"Is there something in particular you wanted, Git-Features?"

Lister got up again, pulling the can from his pocket and popping the ring, taking a slurp before starting to wonder around the console.

"She's doing much better," he said as he paced, bouncing the ball off the ground. "Started eatin' and talkin' to Kryten. I even got a few words out of her this morning'."

"Marvellous…" said Rimmer coolly, returning his gaze to the monitor. Lister frowned, slipping his hand in his pocket.

"Yeah. She's great, in't she?"

"Hm…"

" Homo sapien 101. All solid and alive and stuff."

"Mmhm."

Lister caught the tennis ball, then threw it straight through Rimmer, causing him to snap his head up.

"Oi!" he said sharply.

"Don't you care?" Lister said in exasperation. "You've been up here for days, looking at that stupid screen like everythin's normal! There's a woman in that room, Rimmer. Wo-man. I know doesn't come up often in your vocabulary but even you still know what it means!"

Rimmer shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

"Lister?" he said, his voice still calm and level.

"What?"

"Kindly bog off, would you?"

Lister threw his hand in the air, turning to face the door.

"You're a nutter, y'know that? I'm going back down there to talk to her. Kryten reckons she's well enough to know about her situation now. I'm gonna tell her. Clearly I'm the only one that has any interest in what she's goin' through, as the only other human bein' in the universe!" He shook his head as he left the room, leaving the hologram to stare vehemently at his navigation notes. If he had been able to, he was pretty certain he would have punched Lister square in the chops.

Of course he cared. He'd done barely anything but think about Anneke Thorne and her wellbeing since the moment he'd clapped eyes on her pod. But in all realism, what could he do? He was comprised entirely of light, had the social skills of a teaspoon, the only other occasion he'd spent any time with a woman she was suffering a mild brain injury…

Being able to walk around, as it turned out, did not make him any less dead. It just made him all the more conscious of it. Anneke had told him her name, that was enough. If she felt comfortable around Lister now, then wonderful. He didn't need to be involved anymore.

"Bollocks," he muttered to the empty room.

He waited as long as he was able to tolerate it. About ninety seconds. Then he turned and walked out of the room, silently tailing Lister.

* * *

"Ey, look, don't cry, it's not all that bad, I mean, we don't know what we might find out here…"

Rimmer stood at the end of the corridor, watching, as Lister stammered around in circles apologetically. He heard something hit the window with a loud thud and the young man jumped back, hands on his head.

"Smeg! Look, I was just tryin' to do you a favour, better you know now than find out on your own- Hey! Hey, come on, switch it off! Anneke!"

From his spot in the shadows, he heard a string of expletives come over the speaker to the girl's room. Lister raised his hands in a motion of surrender.

"Alright, alright. You need some time, fair enough. Look, you know if you want or need anything', I'm here. Just ask Holly, ok?"

A silent pause.

"Right, well… I'll leave ye in peace then…"

He turned to leave and Rimmer ducked into the wall out of sight, waiting for his booted feet to clump away. When he was sure he was alone, he stepped out again, hands on his hips, brown knitted in thought.

_Smoothly done, Lister,_ he thought to himself, shaking his head.

_Could you have done any better, Smeghead? _came an unbidden reply.

Grinding his teeth, he turned on the spot to leave, then paused, instead looking to one of Holly's ports on the wall.

"Holly, show me the inside of quarantine bay five one two," he said, folding his arms, fingers tapping lightly on his bicep. An image washed over the screen, a grainy feed showing the small form of a woman sat cross legged in the centre of the room, hands clasped over her head, tangled in her hair at the nape of her neck. A cup was in the middle of the linoleum floor. That must have been the noise on the glass; she'd thrown it at Lister.

"Lister, you tit," he muttered, bowing his head for a moment to exhale before looking up at the screen again. "Is she alright?"

"Heart rate and epinephrine levels are raised, but yes, Arnold, she's fine."

"Right. Well. Good then." He made a step towards the flight of stairs to up to the next deck, then stopped, closing his eyes.

"Oh, for goodness sakes…"

Then he was turning, walking down the narrow, dark corridor, twitching the knot of his tie to make sure it was entirely central. As he reached the edge of the bay he stopped, taking a few deep breaths before leaning forwards to look in the window.

Instead he was met by his own reflection. She had locked them out on privacy mode.

"Ah," he uttered. "Probably for the best…"

He straightened up, swivelling back to face the steps yet again, when he heard the soft voice over the com;

"Mister Rimmer?"

He screwed his face up silently, his mind screaming at him.

_You were almost off Scott free, you twit! Now you'll have to answer her. Good luck with that!_

As he squared himself up to the window, hands clasped nervously behind his back, the silver sheen faded, revealing the room behind. The lieutenant was stood on the other side of the glass, all of six inches between them, and as she came into sight, Rimmer went numb from the neck down.

She was looking up at him in that piercing way she had, her platinum hair falling past her shoulders to the middle of her back, gleaming under the halogen lights. She much smaller than him, barely coming up to his shoulder, slightly built with smooth, slim arms, bare in the simple white vest top she was wearing. Her face was young with Nordic features, cool and clean, the tips of her long eyelashes the same pale shade as her hair. As he gawped at her she lifted one trembling hand to tap her fingertips on the glass, saying his name again.

"Mister Rimmer? Is it true?"

_She's talking to you! Hello, anybody home? Answer her! _

"I, er… Sorry, what?" he fumbled, managing to will his legs to work and carry him back a few steps. She watched him for a moment before repeating herself.

"Is it true?"

He forced a swallow as he looked at her. There were small lines on her fair cheeks, tear tracks.

"You've been talking to Lister?"

She nodded and he jammed his hands into his pockets, mainly to have something to do with them.

"I'm afraid it is…"

The girl let out a small noise of pain, turning her back on him and taking a few paces round the room, fingers pressed to her lips, mumbling into them,

"Oh my God, oh my God… Three million, oh my God…"

She stopped, closing her eyes and inhaling deeply through her nose, stood in profile to him, her bare feet just visible out the end of the voluminous grey cotton trousers Kryten had found for her. Rimmer rocked on the balls of his feet for a moment, before pointing one thumb over his shoulder.

"I should probably go," he muttered, already edging away. The girl looked up, hands falling to her side, a frantic look in her eyes.

"Wait."

"Look, I, er… I'm not your man for this, trust me," Rimmer said, taking another step back. She was walking towards the glass again, face surprisingly calm, though her voice was cracking.

"Please. I just found out my entire species apart from that man-" She pointed down the corridor in the direction had not long left "-is extinct. Can't you give me one minute of your time?"

She looked up at him imploringly and Rimmer felt his shoulders slump.

"What do you want?" he said softly.

"Talk to me," she begged, more tears gathering in her eyes.

"About what?" Rimmer could hear his own voice becoming higher and higher pitched, his hands trembling as he clasped them behind his back.

"Anything. I don't care. Anything at all. Just say something…"

She sat heavily on the ground, her legs crossed, looking utterly defeated. Rimmer opened his mouth, then closed it again. He did this a few times, then finally summoned a chair from Holly and pulled it up to the very edge of the window. Perching on it nervously, he looked down at the girl inside, struggling to find his voice;

"The last thing I ate before things went belly up round here was a cup of chicken soup. It was my last meal ever and it was absolutely revolting. Like sick in a cup. You?"

With surprise, he heard a small, two second long laugh come from the girl, before she looked up at him, tapping her forehead as she spoke,

"You are a hologram then? That's pretty impressive. In my day we didn't have colour. Pontioff, Andromeda's engineer, he was in greyscale."

"You didn't answer my question," Rimmer said, feeling an uncomfortable knot in his stomach at the mention of his life-challenged status. He pushed it down, watching as she pulled her knees up to her chest, resting her cheek on one as she thought.

"The last thing I ate on Andromeda… Three garibaldi biscuits, the thin ones with the raisins in, and a double bagger cup of tea."

Rimmer nodded once, mind racing as he struggled for the next question.

"Last film you saw? Mine was Cassablanca. Again."

"Carrie. The one with Sissy Spacek in it from the twentieth century. My bunkmate had a thing about old horror films."

"Last place you walked on solid ground?"

"Io. Planet leave." She looked up at him, resting her chin in her palm.

"Hm. I was born on Io," Rimmer said, feeling himself smile slightly, a rush of warmth filling his face.

"There, you see? You can talk to me after all…" Anneke tucked her hair behind her ear with a wan smile. "It's not that much trouble." Rimmer could feel the heat in his cheeks getting worse, breaking her gaze as he started again;

"Last book you read..?"


	5. Chapter 5

**Finally found the time to write another chapter, yay. Also, I watched the whole of Red Dwarf X in one sitting the other day. Soooo good! Much much much better than Back to Earth IMHO. Happy bunny I was :) Please RnR guys!**

* * *

Anneke sat flicking a grape around the table in the quarantine bay, letting out a sigh, her left arm outstretched. She winced as Kryten withdrew a blood sample from the inside of her elbow, the small purple fruit rolling off the rim and onto the floor.

"One more moment, ma'am," Kryten said, screwing the vial closed, then removing the tourniquet. He pressed a wad of cotton wool to the tiny crimson mark, Anneke putting her finger over it while he tore a piece of micro porous tape and tacked it down.

"There we are, miss Anneke. All done."

Anneke pumped her fingers, flexing her arm a couple of times to bring the feeling back into the joint.

"Same time tomorrow?" she asked.

"Afraid so, ma'am."

"Alright," she said despondently, getting up to pick up the grape. She threw it up in the air and caught it a few times, eyes tracing it as Kryten fussed around her, picking up an abandoned glass and bowl.

"Can I get you anything, ma'am?"

"No, thank you Kryten. I'm fine."

"Very well. You can always call on me should you change your mind." The droid stepped into the airlock between the room and the rest of the ship, pausing to receive a spray of decontaminate mist. Anneke watched him walk past, then threw the grape at the window, watching it bounce off and roll under her bunk. She chased after it, falling onto hands and knees to grapple under the bed for it. As she wriggled out again, she heard a laugh behind her and spun around, seeing Lister stood out in the hall, a few books tucked under his arm.

"Having fun?" he said, leaning with one elbow on the glass.

"Do I look like I'm having fun?" the girl replied, tossing the grape into a wastepaper basket on the other side of the room and wiping her palms down her trousers.

"Not really," Lister said with a grin, tapping one of the books on the glass. "Here. I brought ye these, thought they might help." Kneeling, he punched a combination into a small bright keypad under the window and a chute shunted out. He shoved the books in and it sucked back in, then popped out the other side in the quarantine room. Anneke bent to pick them up, looking at the titles, nose wrinkling at the smell of decontaminate chemicals sprayed on them.

"The Count of Monte Cristo. The Picture of Dorian Gray. You have good taste," she said in surprise.

"Nah, never read em. I got Holly to print me out a copy of the library's top one hundred," Lister chuckled, cocking his hat. Anneke hugged the books to her chest, tucking one ankle behind the other.

"Thank you. Look, I… I'm sorry about the other day… For shouting at you…"

"Aah, s'alright," Dave said, tucking his hands in his trouser pockets. "It's not easy, is it? Honestly, you actually took it better than I expected."

"Kryten says I have to be in here at least six weeks."

"S'not that long really," said Lister.

"No, I suppose in comparison to three million years, it isn't…" the girl replied with a wry smile.

"And when you're out, I can show you round the ship, give you the full tour. Ye can have a life here, with us."

"Hm." The smile widened slightly and she hugged the books under one arm, reaching the other out towards the side of the window. "Thanks for the books, Dave."

Lister leant closer to the window, smiling toothily.

"And then maybe we can go for a drink, ye can tell me about yourself and then-"

"Bye, Dave."

She pressed her palm to the switch and the window blacked out, leaving Lister staring at his own reflection.

"Bye, Anneke…"

He turned and wandered down the corridor out of the quarantine deck, exhaling loudly as he did.

Inside the room, the girl sat on her bunk, legs crossed, flicking the copy of Dorian Gray open in her lap. Licking her thumb she turned the pages, scanning over the first few paragraphs, before coughing into her hand, the chemicals catching in her throat.

* * *

Rimmer lay on his bunk, hands clasped beneath his head, feet resting on the wall. Above him Lister was snoring noisily, one arm hanging over the edge of the top bed. He blew a raspberry, before glancing at the neon clock over on the wall opposite. It was past three in the morning. Tutting, he rolled over onto his side, closing his eyes and tried to force sleep to come.

* * *

Anneke paced around her room in a slow circle, swinging her arms idly. After a few circuits she paused, looking around herself, letting out a low breath and rubbed her upper arms briskly, shivering with tiredness. Wandering to the dispenser on the wall, she ordered a cup of builder strength tea, hugging it to her chest. Then she went to the window, peering around at the seams semi-curiously, blowing across the top of her drink before she slurped cautiously from the bright plastic cup, her pale reflection in the opaque glass mimicking her.

"Mmhm…"

The girl blinked as she heard someone clear their throat. Slapping her palm on the privacy switch she saw Rimmer melt into view, looking slightly sheepish as he tucked his hands in his dressing gown pockets, giving her a small nod.

"Hi," Anneke said in surprise, sipping her tea.

"Morning," he said softly, rubbing the heel of his hand on his brow with a yawn.

"Just about. It's four o'clock… Can't sleep either, hm?"

"Mm. Holly said you were awake. Is everything alright? Chair please, Holly." He perched himself in the middle of the corridor, linking his hands in his lap.

"I've not really slept since I arrived," she said, sitting on the edge of the table in her room. "I suppose I got it all in one lump, all that time in cryo…" She sat on the table, crossing her legs, resting her cup on her knee.

"Is there anything we can do to help?"

"I don't think so," she said, shaking her head slightly. She took a sip and they sat in awkward silence for a minute, before she looked up at him, tapping her fingers on the plastic.

"Do you mind if I ask you something personal?"

Rimmer swallowed, arching an eyebrow. He gripped his hands together tighter.

"I suppose it depends what it is," he said, feeling his voice quiver.

"How did it happen?" she asked, untucking one leg to let it dangle. "I mean, you know… How did you become a hologram? If it is ok to ask…"

"Oh. That." Rimmer coughed, rubbing his forehead next to the H emblazoned upon it. "In the accident. It was a radiation leak. Cadmium. Someone forget to seal a drive plate properly..." He coughed again, feeling his face colour.

"Gosh," she breathed. "Nasty. Sorry, it was probably a bit insensitive of me to bring it up."

"It's alright," Rimmer replied, shuffling back slightly in his seat. "You were more polite than most."

Anneke smiled up at him tentatively, her leg swinging back and forth slowly.

"I'm going to ask a lot of questions. I know some of them will be stupid. But time and things just seem all… higgledy piggledy now. I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. I'm not quite sure how to, but, I am trying."

"It's alright," the hologram said again, more slowly. "We're here to help. If that means answering questions, we'll do the best we can. Of course, given who we've got to provide the answers, I can't put any guarantee on their quality."

She smiled again and Arnold felt himself doing so in return, albeit with great caution.

"Everyone keeps saying that to me. 'We're here to help you.' I don't know what I did to deserve all this fuss," she said, swilling the last of the tea round and round in the bottom of the cup.

"We don't get much in the way of luck round here," Rimmer replied, resting back in his chair, arms folded. "I think it's just good to see a fresh face."

"I can't believe I'm the only one you found," she said, staring into the cup. "There were so many of us. We followed proper evac protocol."

"Can I be honest with you?" Rimmer asked carefully, his voice low. "I don't want to upset you, but still…"

"What is it, Mister Rimmer?"

"There are no records of what happened to your ship. Literally nothing. No black box, no pods coming back. It vanished. You are the first person from the Andromeda to ever be found. At all."

The girl closed her eyes, thin lines crossing her brow, her fingers blanching on her cup.

"Oh God," she whispered.

"What happened to that ship, Anneke?" he said softly, leaning forwards on his thighs.

She took a deep breath, shaking her head a little as though trying to clear it, her eyes misty as she opened them again. She stared down at the cream linoleum floor, her leg twitching.

"Fire. My God, fire like you've never seen. We were sprayed by a meteor storm. These little bullets of ice and dust ripped their way through us, tiny, tiny things. They just tore us to pieces, straight through the bulkhead, into the guts of the ship. One of the coolant radiators was caught and exploded. The engines were spilling out into space and this… this wall of fire swept it's way along the deck. It fried the comm-systems."

She paused, running her hand through her hair and holding onto the tips tightly.

"I was a communication officer. It was my job to make some sense out of this chaos and get people to safety. But there were no channels anymore. We were trying to be professionals. To get the pods loaded and launched. I was running around with bits of sodding paper between stations because I didn't even have a bloody radio. There was no guidance for the pods at that point, no homing beacons. All the relays were frazzled. I made the choice and I flushed them into space. Like throwing a message in a bottle into the sea and hoping it gets somewhere to be read.

"I was going to stay. I was doing my job until I couldn't do it anymore, it's what I swore when I signed up. But the captain made me take his pod. It was the last one. He said the only noble thing for him to do would be to go down with Andromeda. That was his job. So I got in and then I woke up here. Oh my God, all those people…"

She dropped the cup then, her head sinking into her hands, breathing rapid through her fingers.

"I killed all those people…" she choked.

Rimmer shot to his feet, going to lean his hand on the glass before remembering he couldn't. He hissed through his teeth in frustration, then stepped as close as he could, his voice urgent;

"Anneke. Anneke, listen to me. You didn't kill anyone. Believe me, you didn't. Anneke, look at me, please."

She pushed her hair out of her face, fingers resting on her jaw as she looked up at him, eyes rimmed scarlet, wet tracks on her cheeks.

"You didn't kill anyone," he repeated. "You gave them a chance. Who knows, they could have all drifted to moons and planets and space stations and quietly lived out their days in peace. Just because no-one knows what happened to them doesn't mean it was something awful. You did your job and got them away from the ship. You couldn't have done any more than that. You're not a killer."

"How do you know?" she whispered, almost pleading with him.

"Honestly, I'm not a terrific judge of character usually. But anyone who heard what I just heard knows you did everything you could. Besides, I know who didn't seal the drive plates on Red Dwarf. You are nothing like them. You did the right thing, Anneke…" He tailed off rather helplessly, not sure what else to say to the woman. Grief and comforting were hardly his fortes. Although he did know guilt. Guilt he hoped he could help with.

She looked up at him in a daze, shadows beneath her eyes, sliding off the table to stand.

"I think I would like to try and sleep again now," she breathed, inching towards the privacy pad. Rimmer straightened up, shoving his hands awkwardly in his dressing gown pockets.

"Probably a good idea," he murmured.

"Maybe you should too."

"I'll leave you in peace."

"Come talk to me some more soon?" she asked, tilting her head as she wiped her face with the heel of her hand. "Preferably sooner than a week from now? Dave's doing my head in. His level of keen is a bit bonkers."

Rimmer looked at her in surprise, feeling his jaw slacken. An uncomfortably long pause passed before he remembered his voice.

"You want me to visit you again?" he asked, trying to sound nonchalant and failing spectacularly as the words wavered and squeaked.

"I feel as if you're my only friend in the universe right now. I'd appreciate it if you did."

"Right… Right, yes. Of course," he managed, gripping the linings of his pockets tightly. "You should sleep for now though."

"Mmhm. Goodnight, Mister Rimmer. Or good morning. Whichever." She left him with one last, thin smile before the glass blacked out, leaving him staring at it blankly for several long seconds before he finally willed his legs to work.


	6. Chapter 6

**Hi guys! Here we are :) Thanks for those who have left kind reviews, you make a poorly girl very happy hehe.**

* * *

Anneke stepped out of the shower in her quarantine bay, towel wrapped around her like a tube dress. Sitting on the edge of her bunk she dragged a brush through her wet hair, nose wrinkled at the smell of the iodine shampoo. When it was knotless she grabbed a couple of elastic bands from her bedside locker and rubbed some ship issue perfume-free moisturiser onto them, before scooping her hair into an artful twist and securing it in a bun. After this she dressed in a crop top and sweats, standing to look at herself in the floor length mirror inside the bathroom door. Pulling the waistband of the trousers down she carefully inspected her hips, scowling at the greying bruises splayed over the right one, then bent over to roll up her trouser leg. Wrinkling her nose, she pulled off the damp dressing on her calf, muttering to herself,

"Oh joy," as she revealed a fresh purple scar a couple of inches long underneath. "Well, it's opaque tights from now on, Anna."

Throwing the dressing into the bin, she bounced up and down on the spot a few times, then stretched her arms over her head, linking her fingers and feeling a few satisfying clicks come from her shoulders as she pulled. Bending at the waist, she fell forwards to touch her toes, holding for a few seconds, then uncurled, looking around herself with an exasperated sigh.

"Urch, bored."

She mused for a moment, then clicking her fingers rapidly, she wandered over to the chest of drawers beside her bunk, kneeling to rifle through them. Tossing aside some documentary cassettes and a pack of stationary pads, she lay her hand on the bottom item in the cabinet, a smile creeping over her features as she pulled it out.

* * *

"Incoming message, Arnold. Wakey wakey."

With a snort Rimmer darted out of his bed, throwing himself into his callisthenics. After a few star jumps he slumped, realising he was in the room alone, Holly still trying to get his attention;

"Oi, you've got a message."

The hologram arched his eyebrows, looking up at the computer.

"I have?"

"Yep. Want it?"

"Ideally, yes…" he said, rolling his eyes. He turned to face the screen, folding his arms. Holly's face faded to black, before being replaced by a line of square red text:

'MR RIMMER, DO YOU PLAY CHESS?'

"Huh…" Rimmer muttered in surprise. "Erm… Shower please, Holly…"

* * *

Half an hour later he was hesitantly stood outside the lieutenant's window, fiddling with his shirt cuff buttons, his own twitchy reflection looking back at him. He coughed a couple of times and heard a chair move, a click clearing the glass. Anneke greeted him with a warm but weary smile, stepping closer to look up at him.

"Morning," she said brightly.

"Morning again," Rimmer replied stiffly.

"I hope you didn't't mind the I.M," she said, rubbing a bruise on her upper arm idly.

"No, no, not at all, no…" he mumbled.

"What was the answer then?" She took a couple of steps back from the glass, hitching her trousers so they sat comfortably on her hips. They were definitely too big. Rimmer watched her, a low buzzing in his ears as he spoke.

"Hm? Sorry?"

She smiled, moving aside to reveal a chequered board with polished wooden pieces carefully arranged on it.

"Can you play chess?" she asked.

Rimmer felt his stomach lurch, his mind rapidly hissing at him;

_Lie. Say yes, you gimboid. Don't let her no you're a useless tit!_

"Of course," he mumbled, immediately regretting it.

_Ha! That's it! Now you're going to have to play her and she'll know you're a useless tit anyway! See what you did there, Arnold? You shot yourself in the foot with a double barrelled rifle. That'll teach you to listen to yourself!_

"Brilliant!" Anneke grinned, wandering round to sit at the table. "Play me, would you? I'm going stir crazy. And I've got another hour before Kryten comes down. I'll even let you be white. It's only good manners."

_Oooooh, smeg it…._

She brushed a stray lock of hair away from her eyes, pulling one leg up as she settled into the chair, hands resting on her knee, looking up at him expectantly. A lengthy pause passed between them and she tilted her head, an unmistakable pale pink blush spreading over her cheeks.

"That is, of course, if you have time," she said softly.

"I do! No, I do, I do, oodles of time!" Rimmer gushed, his holographic chair appearing in front of the window. He sat in it hurriedly, his insides doing somersaults.

"I'll move the pieces for you then," Anneke said, smiling once more. "Just say which."

_Right, Arnold. You can do this. Father tried to hammer chess into you as child, some of it must have sunk into that thick skull of yours. It's only a board game. You're fine._

"Alright then," he mumbled, gripping the bottom of the chair by his thighs tightly. "Pawn to G four."

"Mmhm." Anneke picked up one of the smaller white pieces, edging it forwards a couple of squares, then moved a pawn of her own. "Next?"

"Pawn to F three."

Small fingers moved another white piece in a diagonal to the first, then picked up the black queen and swept it across the board before plonking it down neatly next to the pawns.

"Check and mate."

"What?!" Rimmer stared at the board open mouthed, feeling a surge of nausea. Anneke shrugged her white shoulders, smiling gently.

"It's a fool's mate. Haven't you seen it before?" she asked.

"Can't say I have…" Rimmer muttered, looking at the board incredulously. Anneke watched him carefully, picking up the pieces and putting them back in their starting positions, then twisted the board so she was now sat at white and placed one of her pawns in the centre.

"Ready when you are." The hologram nodded once, doing his best to look nonchalant.

"Right. Pawn to E five then please."

Anneke moved the piece for him, mirroring her own, then carefully slid a bishop forwards.

"Bishop to C five."

The girl smiled slightly, moving the piece opposite her own bishop and twitched her queen onto another square.

"Knight to F six, please." Rimmer crossed his arms over his chest, starting to relax slightly. At least he was playing an actual game now, he could almost look like he knew what he was doi-

"Checkmate."

He blinked a couple of times, staring at the board. She'd taken his pawn, that was all. But somehow she had beaten him again, in less time than it took for most people to go to the toilet.

"Sorry," Anneke said, looking a little sheepish. Her fingers hovered over the board, still hanging over her queen.

"How did you…"

"I guess you didn't see me coming," she said, looking at him levelly. "Should I start a couple of pieces down? Maybe you need to warm up a bit."

_You've been scuppered, miladdo!_

Rimmer let out a sigh, his hands falling to his lap, avoiding her gaze.

"The truth is, technically, I suppose I can't really play…" he murmured, feeling mortified as he said the words. "I mean, I know the logistics behind it but… well…"

_Oh Lord, please let the ground open up and swallow me whole._

He couldn't bear to look up. Why did he feel this impulse to lie? Just when he was starting to make headway with this woman, to have real conversations with her, she was going to realise he was a total and utter smeghead.

"So do you know how the pieces move then?"

His head snapped up and he swallowed, feeling the familiar lump of lead in his throat.

"Sorry, what?"

"Do you know how each piece works?" Anneke asked again, smiling gently at him.

"I er, yes, I think so," he stammered.

"Well alright then, I'll teach you. You should have said before, I wouldn't have been quite so aggressive," she chuckled, resetting the pieces and removing her queen and one of her bishops. "Let's start with a few different opening tricks, hm?"

Rimmer felt himself break into a smile as she began to talk him through some techniques on how to seize the board, gesturing animatedly at the cheque mat and pushing pieces around as she talked. She hadn't shot him down. She hadn't sat in judgement of him. She was treating him like a normal person, offering him help, even if it was for something as simple as a board game. He leant forwards to listen, eventually finding his voice again to start asking the odd question, feeling a slow burn of pleasure work it's way through him as they talked. She was treating him like a friend.

When Kryten arrived to take his samples they were settled into a rough game, Anneke occasionally going back a couple of turns to explain where he was making a mistake. As the mechanoid was letting himself into the bay Rimmer saw her gaze drift to the door, attention slipping.

"Anneke?" he said cautiously.

"It's only going to be a minute," she said quietly. "Do you mind waiting? Or you can go if you want."

"I'll wait," he said, straightening up in his seat.

She nodded with a thin smile and got to her feet as Kryten came in, his tray of medical equipment in hand. Before he could say a word she stuck her arm out towards him, causing the service droid to blink in surprise.

"Let's get it over with, shall we?" she said.

"Ma'am, it would be easier if you could take a seat," Kryten replied, looking bemused. The girl sighed, then nodded, settling into her chair sideways. The droid set up the vacutainer, strapped a tourniquet round her upper arm and eventually found a vein. Anneke made a small noise of discomfort as he punctured her skin, the area around it looking dark and angry with bruises. He drew a couple of sample vials, then took her pulse, temperature and blood pressure before packing it all up again, taping a cotton wool ball over the pinprick. The girl looked up at him, bending her arm a few times.

"Any news?" she asked.

"Still clear, ma'am," Kryten said, looking at her apologetically.

"Well, that's good then." she said, rubbing her elbow. "Hopefully it'll stay that way."

"I'm sure it shall, Miss Thorne."

"I'll see you tomorrow, Kryten," Anneke said, getting to her feet to steer him out of the bay. Rimmer sat in silence as the droid left, watching the girl sink back into her seat, her smile gone now as she picked up her rook and exchanged places with the king. She looked despondent and with a careful glance he noticed her arms were becoming sore and blue from the daily testing routine.

"Not that long to go," he said, making a weak attempt at comfort.

"At least thirty two more days," she mumbled, crossing her legs in her chair.

"It'll fly by," he said, shuffling his chair as close to the window as he could.

"I'm not so sure," she replied, tapping her fingertip on the rook.

He sucked his teeth, feeling a twinge of panic. She was sinking, he could see it, bogged down by the weight of her situation.

"Do you know what I miss about Earth?" he said quickly, hoping to snap her out of it. She looked up at him, brow quirked.

"What?" she asked, resting her cheek in her palm.

"Pizza," he said with a cautious smile. "It used to be a guilty pleasure of mine."

She laughed then and it was all he could do to keep himself from a proud fist pump.

"I agree," she said, taping her fingertips on her cheek a couple of times. "The universe just won't be the same without a ham and mushroom with barbecue base. Know what I'll miss?"

"Go on. Knight to C six, please."

"Bicycles. I can't drive, I used to cycle everywhere back home." She moved his piece, then her bishop, settling back into the game.

"What else?" Rimmer asked, resting his arms on his knees. This was what she needed, he understood now. She needed a distraction, something benign and harmless. He would ask her daft questions, he would let her teach him board games, he'd fritter away as many hours with her as he could if that was what she wanted. It wasn't much but it could make the difference between her coming through the other side of quarantine in one piece or letting the reality of things swallow her up. If she dropped him like a stone once she was out, that was fair enough. But for now it seemed he had something to offer her and he had to admit, he was beginning to enjoy his time spent in the quarantine bay more than anything else.

"Jacuzzis, the really hot ones that would make me turn all pink, Your turn."


	7. Chapter 7

**Woohoo, now that Yule etc is all wrapped up I finally have some time to sit an write. If I'm honest, I'm not entirely sure about this chapter, but I did have to get things moving, so apologies if it seems clunky :S As always, please R+R guys!**

* * *

Over the ensuing days Anneke and Rimmer began to settle into something of a routine together. In the mornings he would hover while Kryten took his medical samples, trying to distract her from the needles with benign chatter, then they would pass a few pleasant hours playing chess, Anneke hammering him every time, no matter how many times she let him mulligan. All the while they would exchange snippets of information about themselves with one another and gradually Rimmer was beginning to build a picture of her; she had a soft spot for dairy and old British comedies; she could speak three languages; she'd not wanted to join the Space Corps originally but instead be a teacher, she'd only joined up to pay for her university tuition fees. Each day became an opportunity to peel away another layer and today, three weeks exactly after she had arrived, was no exception:

"An elder sister, Liv. You? Your move. You're in check, by the way."

"Three older brothers. John, Howard and Frank. They were all Space Corps captains. Erm, I'm a bit stuck."

"That's the danger square, that white one. Were you close?"

"Yes and no. I tended to be their source of cruel and unusual entertainment. Can I move the knight there?"

"Mmhm, it'd be covered by your rook. Good idea." Anneke rest her chin in her palm as she gazed at the board, crossing her legs. "Liv was a pianist. She was lovely. She'll be dead now, won't she? They all will. She was so clever. Bugger…" The girl stared vehemently down at the pieces, then pushed her king over after a few seconds, the black polished wood rolling a couple of inches before coming to a stop next to a pawn.

"I resign," she murmured. "You win."

Rimmer blinked as she got up from her seat, rubbing her face and coughing a few times. Then the penny dropped.

"I lost my father a couple of months ago," he said carefully, getting to his feet, his hands tucked in his pockets. "I mean, I knew that he had been dead forever, but I got this letter informing me when the post pod eventually caught us up. It was horrid, as though it was happening there and then."

Anneke peered at him over her fingertips, voice muffled as she asked,

"What did you do?"

He shrugged, shaking his head slightly.

"I accepted it for what it was I suppose. I talked to Lister about it, which was frankly a little bizarre. It may have been three million years ago but it may as well have been the day before."

Anneke nodded slightly, settling back into her seat, folding her hands in her lap.

"Did it help?" she asked.

"Actually, yes. Ish."

She managed a weak smile, tucking her pale hair behind her ear.

"What was he like?"

"Who, my father?"

Anneke nodded, clearing her throat as she scooched forwards on her chair. Rimmer took a deep breath out of pure habit, contemplating for a moment, his hands curling into fists in his pockets.

"An absolute bastard," he said finally, sinking back into his chair. Anneke's mouth opened slightly in surprise, her bright eyes widening.

"Oh…" she breathed. Rimmer held his hands up quickly, stammering,

"Don't get me wrong, I, I respected him and I suppose I did love him, but… well…" He was getting flustered, his face reddening. Anneke shook her head slightly, tapping her fingers on her knee.

"You don't have to explain yourself to me, mister Rimmer," she said. The hologram leant forwards, running a hand through his mess of curls, embarrassment threatening to swallow him up.

"Look, he… He wasn't a good man. I'm not even sure he was a sane one," he muttered, avoiding her gaze. "He had these impossible standards. He couldn't join up because he was one smegging inch below regulation Corps height, so he decided to live vicariously through my brothers and I. They were able to meet his expectations but I couldn't do it. I could never do it. If he wasn't satisfied with my progress to potential officer hood, he wouldn't let me eat, he'd use the belt. I could never be what he wanted, even when I tried and I tried. I'm still trying now. He terrified me as a boy…"

_SMEG! Since when did you develop verbal diarrhoea, you neurotic, emotional retard! Stop talking before you make a namby-pamby twat of yourself. Like she is going to care?!_

He could hear Anneke speaking, her voice soft and serious;

"Oh my God. I am so, so sorry. It was none of my business, I shouldn't have asked…"

He didn't want to look at her. He'd opened his mouth when he shouldn't have. The pseudo-friendship he had cobbled together with her was safe, preserved by four inches of shatter-roof glass and thus far the careful avoidance of _feelings_. Why did he have to compulsively ruin things for himself?

She was tapping on the glass rapidly, trying to get his attention.

"Arnold?"

_Dear Lord, she used your name…_

He looked up at her then, awkward and ashamed, to find her kneeling before the window, hand outstretched on the glass, reaching for him. He didn't know what to make of this. Was this pity? Guilt? Either way, he couldn't help himself; he lifted his own hand till his fingers hovered a few millimetres over the glass, over hers, unable to make contact but trying none the less. She smiled up at him, a sympathetic, apologising smile, coughing behind closed lips a couple of times, her eyes watering as she did. The crouping sound broke the spell and Rimmer snatched his hand away quickly, getting to his feet and hitching his belt.

"I should go," he blurted, all pomp and pride once more. "I left the skutters to their own devices touching up the paintwork on level eighty four, goodness knows what they've done to it without supervision, I-"

A low tone from Holly's interface behind him cut the hologram off, giving him the perfect opportunity to break her gaze and turn away. The screen before him briefly showed the computer's visage, who announced unceremoniously,

"Incoming video call from Kryten, patching him through."

Moments later the mechanoid's angular face faded onto the screen, his square jaw serious. His backdrop was the off-white cabinets of the medibay and he held a ribbon of stripy printout paper in his nodular hands.

"Mister Rimmer, sir, I've just completed today's analysis of Lieutenant Thorne's samples. I'm afraid I have extrapolated some positive results. Sending them over to you now."

A few clicks and a mechanical whirring came into life from a slot below the screen, beginning to spit out a strip of paper similar to the one Kryten was clutching. Rimmer looked down at it, Anneke tapping on the window again behind him, calling out to him.

"Mister Rimmer, what is going on please?"

The hologram stared at the narrow slip, feeling his stomach drop past his boots as he read it. When it was done printing it fell from the slot and sunk to the floor in a graceful curve, resting in a tight curl. Unable to pick it up, Rimmer squatted to read what he could, then looked up at Anneke who was on her feet now, both hands resting on the glass as she peered down at him anxiously.

"What?" she said.

"You're sick…"

* * *

Anneke sat with a blood pressure cuff wrapped uncomfortably tight round her arm, huffing into a peak flow tube, Kryten noting down the number from the plastic casing. Outside the quarantine bay window Lister stood with his arms crossed over his chest, tapping one foot, watching.

"This is ridiculous," the girl mumbled through a mouthful of glass thermometer as Kryten slipped it between her teeth. "I feel fine."

"I believe ye," Lister said with an attempt at a jovial smile. "But Kryten found a spike in ye temp'recha, we can't be too careful. It's important that three weeks from now you walk outta here fit an' well."

"I will! I'm alright, it's warm in here that's all, you're making a fuss over nothing…"

At the very end of the corridor, Rimmer stood just within earshot but well away from the quarantine room's view. He couldn't look at Anneke. He could hear her protesting but he knew, he -knew-, she was sick. She'd kept coughing, a dry, wheezing sound, and they'd both ignored it. Kryten's samples had been coming back clean so they'd both silently brushed it aside, never even giving it enough merit to mention it.

She'd called him by his first name. No one did that, not for years and years they hadn't. Rimmer or Bonehead or Oi-Git-Features maybe. No one called him Arnold.

He had to get out. He couldn't think in the dark corridor of the quarantine deck, catching snippets of Lister and Anneke's conversation. He turned sharply and virtually ran up the stairs to the next floor, barking an order for an Xpress Lift to open. He needed to be outside and the closest thing he could get to that was the Observation Deck.

* * *

Back in her narrow room, Anneke looked out of her window at Lister, taking a sip of water from a plastic cup after Kryten relieved her of the thermometer.

"Thirty seven point eight degrees, ma'am. That's a point two increase in the last hour," the droid said, looking at her levelly. The girl shook her head, voice pleading as she called to Lister,

"Please, Dave, tell him to stop dithering would you? I feel fine, I-"

She was cut short as her breath caught and she burst into a dry, painful cough, the water lapping over the rim of the cup and splashing onto her leg. Kryten took the drink from her hurriedly, setting it to one side and massaging her back in a wide circle. Lister looked at her with arched eyebrows, slipping his hands into his leather jacket pockets.

"You were saying?" he said gently as Anneke took a deep breath, Kryten steadying her shoulders.

"It's a cough. Air recyc, it's bad for your chest. Everyone had it on Andromeda," she said hoarsely.

"Ma'am, with respect, I think it best you take this seriously," Kryten said in a tentative voice. "I suggest that you at least begin a course of antipyretic treatment to lower your temperature if nothing else. And I think it may be worth my taking some fresh samples as well…"

Anneke snapped her gaze sharply to the mechanoid, her violet eyes widening.

"You must be joking?" she said softly, defensively crossing her arms over her bust. "You only took some this morning!"

Kryten looked at her slightly nervously, his voice increasing in pitch in the way it usually did when he displeased someone.

"I know ma'am, I'm sorry, but given the rapid increase in your temperature…"

Anneke sighed despondently, rolling up the sleeves of the light cotton shirt she was wearing.

"Fine," she mumbled. Outside the room Lister leant on the glass, giving her a sympathetic smile.

"Just you watch, when it turns out to be all just a cold or sumthin' you'll be laughin' about this," he said, tucking one ankle behind the other, his shoulder resting on the window.

"Oh, I'm sure, hardy har har," Anneke muttered, wrinkling her nose. She hissed through her teeth as Kryten punctured the back of her hand with a needle, filling up a bright yellow plastic vial with dark, sticky looking blood.

"All of this for less than a degree change," she said with a sigh.

"Like I keep telling ye, we're here to look after you," Lister said. "You're important to us."

"Mm…" Anneke looked up at the window, her gaze trailing to either side of Dave. "Erm, what happened to Mister Rimmer by the way?"

* * *

A pair of hologramatic hands hung over the rails of the Observation Deck, Rimmer scowling in frustration as he glared down at them. He felt as though someone had lined his skull with concrete before deciding to take several well aimed knocks at it with a cricket bat. He couldn't shake that moment when the computer had produced that slip of paper, the words stamped on it in grey dot matrix type horribly clear:

**PROBABILITY OF VIRAL CONTAGION: 96.6%.**


	8. Chapter 8

**Here we go, another chapter. I'm sorry if this one and the last one seem a bit... Smeggy. I've had soem nasty writer's block getting from point in the story to another but it should be over now, fingers crossed :) Please review if you can, folks **

* * *

Anneke sat in the centre of her room, the lights dim above her, hands lightly resting on her thighs. She'd been alone for hours. Taking a breath she leant forwards, toes curling as her feet touched the freezing linoleum floor. Cupping her hands she brought them to her lips, breathing into them. She heard herself wheeze.

"What are you doing?"

Anneke jumped, looking up to see Rimmer stood outside her window in his pale blue pyjamas.

"Just experimenting," she said in a low voice. "You're making a habit out of these nocturnal visits, Mister Rimmer. Where have you been?"

Rimmer rubbed the back of his neck, looking guilty. Where had he been? Hiding up on the Observation Deck so she wouldn't see him having a full blown hysterical fit at the thought of something happening to his one and only friend?

"There was a erm, a thing, in the drive room. With the thing. I was very busy," he stammered.

"Oh." Anneke got up, picking up a piece of paper from the square table and flicking it straight to read from it. The corners were dog eared, as though it had been read and re-read.

"Test results," she said. "Kryten sent them about ten o'clock this evening."

"What do they say?" Rimmer asked, a wedge of discomfort in his throat. He'd left her when she may have actually needed him.

"It's viral," she said softly, screwing the paper up into a ball. "A coronavirus." She threw the paper at the wall with surprising ferocity. The hologram took a single step back from the window, highly uncomfortable.

"What's that?" he asked tentatively.

"It's a specific sort of bug. Some strains just cause colds, but others…" The girl paused, rubbing her forehead with the heel of her hand. "We'll just have to wait and see I suppose. The medical computer didn't recognise the strain.I don't understand how this happened…"

"What can we do?" Rimmer asked, beginning to frown.

"Kryten's already started me on antivirals, though he doesn't think it'll do much. Maybe slow it down a bit. And more pills for the temperature. I suppose you'll have to be really red hot on the quarantine now," she rambled, rubbing her hands through her hair. "Thank God you put me in here. I could have killed Dave, and the Cat."

"I didn't mean all that medical stuff, Anneke," Rimmer said gently.

She looked up at him, wringing her hands together.

"I know," she said. "I just don't know what else there is to do…"

"I wish I could help…" The hologram looked through the glass at the girl miserably. She settled onto her chair, tucking one ankle behind the other as she looked up at him.

"You could carry on keeping me company?" she said. "Preferably without doing another vanishing act?"

Rimmer felt himself blushing, much to his annoyance. It seemed such a pointless thing for a hologram to do.

"Of course," he mumbled. "Sorry again about that."

"It's ok," she said. "You're quite shy really, aren't you?"

Rimmer's eyes widened, his face flushing even redder. Anneke smiled at him kindly, shrugging her shoulders.

"It's just an observation," she said. "Nothing personal."

"I suppose you have a point," he said, shaking his head, more to himself than her.

"There is one other thing you could do for me," Anneke said, pulling one leg up in her chair.

"What's that?"

"Do you think you could sort out some music for me? Ella Fitzgerald, Nina Simone, some Rat Pack maybe?" She smiled, shrugging her slim shoulders. "I like old jazz."

* * *

The next morning Rimmer was chasing a skutter down the corridor to Anneke's room, the service robot clutching a stack of CDs in it's claw. When they arrived he spent some time trying to coerce it to drop the discs into the chute to the other room, Anneke kneeling on the other side expectantly, laughing when the little mechanical dropped the cases on the floor and flashed a frustrated Rimmer the 'V Salute'.

Eventually he got them in the drawer, trying to ignore it when Anneke coughed into her fist as she pulled them out. She rubbed her palm on her sternum as she stood, picking out one of the CDs and feeding it into a narrow slot in the wall near the vending machine and the miniature screen for Holly. A few moments later the mellow tones of jazz piano could be heard over the tannoy, along with the smooth, deep voice of Ella Fitzgerald. Anneke broke into a wide smile as she closed the case, joining in briefly under her breath;

"A lucky star's above, but not for me…"

She looked out of the window at Rimmer, tilting her head.

"She had a beautiful voice, didn't she? Thank you so much," she said.

"You're welcome," he replied, settling down in his holographic chair. Anneke turned away, looking through the stack of CDs and arranging them neatly on the table. Rimmer tapped his fingers on his knees, searching for something to say.

"Did you want to play chess today?"

"Honestly? Not really," she said without looking up. "I feel a bit tired."

"Oh. Rightio." He tried to hide his disappointment but couldn't help it. Why didn't she want him there?

_Because you're a useless lump of sputum with all the charm and sophistication of a mollusc?_

He stood to go, Anneke looking out at him with a quirked brow.

"I thought maybe we could just talk today instead?" she said, looking vaguely confused at his attempt at a sharp exit. "Unless you have more pressing matters to attend to?"

"Aah. Oops." Rimmer sunk back onto his chair again, Anneke grinning at him.

"You don't have to keep bolting like that, you know," she said. "If you weren't welcome I would say so_. _But I like having you around."

She pushed her chair closer to the window, leaning forwards with her elbows on the sill, chin in her hands.

"You do?" her companion asked, voice humiliatingly squeaky as he looked down at her, her dark blue eyes regarding him calmly.

"Yes," she replied. Rimmer swallowed, trying to maintain his composure as he felt an unfamiliar swirling sensation in his gut, fingertips tingling.

"Wh-what did you want to talk about?" he said, fixated on the white tips of her eyelashes.

"You," she said gently. "You practically sprinted away from me yesterday once we got onto the subject of your father…"

"There's not really much more to say on the matter," Rimmer sighed. "He was a git, my mother was a stone-hearted mare, my brothers spoilt brats with all the compassion of Oliver Cromwell… I emancipated myself from them when I was fourteen and that was the end of that."

"Except it wasn't, was it?" Anneke said, crossing her legs. Arnold let out a low exhale, shaking his head.

"No, it wasn't. This conversation itself is proof enough of that." He peered down at her through the window, biting the inside of his cheek. "Why the interest anyway?"

"We're friends, aren't we? I want to know about you. So come on, what happened after that?"

He opened his mouth, then closed it again, pausing. She'd said in black and white that they were friends. A wicked word hadn't passed her lips since he'd met her. He could trust her, couldn't he?

"Well, when I divorced my parents I had to find my own way in the world, starting with earning a living…"

* * *

A few hours later Rimmer sat in silence, arms crossed. Anneke had listened to him for ages, not speaking, she'd just let him talk. But then she'd started to flag, her coughing growing worse, until he had made her go and lie down. Now she lay on her side, curled up a foetal position, fast asleep. She looked clammy, her face crossed with shadows, fingers closed tightly around the sheets.

"Holly, what is Lieutenant Thorne's temperature please?"

"Scanning now, Arnold. Thorne, A, temperature currently thirty seven point nine degrees."

"She's getting worse," Rimmer said quietly to himself, rubbing his temples.

"It's only a small change, Arn," Holly chimed in.

"But it's in the wrong direction." Rimmer got up from his seat, pacing up and down the corridor. He wasn't used to this, to worrying about someone else's skin more than his own. It was a wholly unfamiliar feeling and he didn't like it.

Pausing outside the window, he looked in at her again, hands clasped together, index fingers steepled and resting on his lips. Ella Fitzgerald was still playing, a tad crackled as the music came through the speaker. When he realised which song it was, Rimmer felt his phosphorescent heart skip.

"_Looking everywhere, haven't found him yet, he's the one affair I cannot forget, only man I'll ever think of with regret…"_

"Oh my God, that's Gershwin," he breathed. Stepping as close to the glass as he could, he peered at the sleeping woman, jaw slack.

_She's pretty, isn't she, Bonehead? Too pretty for you._

_Shut up._

_What do you think you're going to do, you pathetic, slimy, cowardly little man?_

_Shut. Up._

_She wouldn't look twice at you, you walking waste of existence, you totally worthless twat! What the smeg would she want from -you-? A creature so thick, so selfish, so utterly repellent, so totally beyond affection? Never mind the small fact that you're dead! Oh yes, that's going to do you a smeg-load of favours with a woman like that, isn't it?_

"Bloody buggering Hell!"

Rimmer's outburst jerked Anneke awake, but before she could rub the sleep from her eyes he was gone, fleeing the quarantine deck. She sat on the side of her bed, rubbing her burning face, her chest aching. Struggling to her feet, she stumbled to the dispensing machine, ordering a glass of ice water, sinking it within seconds. Her head was pounding, the halogen strip lights above seeming unbearably bright.

"Holly?" she called hoarsely.

"Yes, Anneke?" the computer answered sunnily.

"Would you turn the lights down please? And maybe dispense me some painkillers?"

"Can do, mate."

A paper cup shot out of the dispenser, two bright pink tablets rolling around inside it. Anneke threw them back as the lights dulled to a low glow, rubbing her eyebrows firmly.

"Lord, I feel like Hell," she groaned, falling back to sitting on the edge of the bed. "Where is everyone, Hol?"

"Dave's in his quarters, Rimmer's on floor four four nine, the Cat's in the cargo decks raiding the cans of tuna and Kryten's in the medi-lab," Holly replied.

Anneke slumped back on her bed, resting her head on the back wall. Clsoing her eyes she took a few deep breaths, trying to stop the spinning in her head.

"I think I've figured it out, you know," she mumbled, more to herself than to the computer. "I know where this came from. Two days before the Andromeda went up in smoke, the catering officer, Tony Capaldi, he kissed me. He was laid up in bed with what we thought was the flu. I took him a card and some orange juice, you know, as a silly something to cheer him up and he tried it on. After I smacked him in the nose he said he was delirious but I knew what he was like. He'd had more skirt that he'd made hot meals. I didn't think anything of it at the time, I'd had my flu jabs that year. He must have slipped me more than just a bit of tongue."

She laughed sardonically, then coughed a few times, rubbing her chest.

"Ow…"

"Anneke, your temperature just peaked thirty eight degrees," Holly said monotonously, still apparently oblivious to any need for concern. "Should I fetch Kryten?"

"No thank you, Holly," she said, crawling into her bunk and curling into a tight ball. "I'm just going to sleep it off, I'll feel better in the morning… Privacy on, please."


	9. Chapter 9

**Haha! Take that writer's block! Also, I apologise for the depressingness...**

* * *

Rimmer sat on the edge of his bed, fiddling with the buttons of his blue 'Home Sweet Home' pyjamas. Lister was sound asleep, gurgling as he snored, still wearing his hat with the peak pulled down low over his head. A quick glance to the clock told him it was coming up to seven in the morning. Anneke would be awake by now. She was a morning person. It must have been the officer in her.

Frowning to himself he stood, pacing up and down in the narrow space of their quarters. He wanted to see her. He'd spent most of the night tossing and turning, worrying about her so much that he'd barely slept. He _really_ wanted to see her. But his thoughts yesterday had frightened him.

"Holly?" he hissed, not wanting to wake his bunkmate. "Holly, you blethering idiot?"

"Yes, Arnold?"

"Is Lieutenant Thorne asleep?"

"No, Arnold."

"Right. Then dress please."

His creaseless khaki uniform phased into being and he twitched the Windsor knot in his tie until it was verging on being uncomfortably tight against his throat. With a quick glance to assure himself Lister was still asleep, he commanded the door open then made his way down towards the quarantine deck, Holly muttering after him,

"You're welcome, Git."

Rimmer trotted down the crimson steel stairs towards the deck lightly, feeling a tingling, swelling sensation in his stomach. As he made his way he slipped his hands into his pockets, whistling to himself, 'Someone to Watch Over Me' stuck in his head still. Something was happening to him. He could feel a shift. It both terrified and excited him, whatever it was, and he knew it was connected to their guest.

When he reached Anneke's room some fifteen minutes later it was to find the privacy function was on, blacking out the window. He cleared his throat, rocking on the balls of his feet. Hopefully she was feeling a bit of an improvement this morning.

After several long seconds of silence he shook his head, leaning closer to the overhead speaker to call into the room;

"Anneke? It's me. Morning!"

Idly rubbing his nose he waited patiently for a response. Another minute passed and he called her name one more time, then turned around to Holly's screen on the opposite wall, glaring at the disembodied head.

"I thought you said she wasn't asleep?" he said tartly.

"She's not," the computer replied, his eyes glazed over.

"Then what? Is she in the shower?"

"No, Arnold."

"Where is she then, Dingleberry Breath?"

"In her room, Arnold."

Scowling, the hologram turned away, stepping from one foot to the other as he looked at the mirrored window.

"Anneke? Anneke, are you alright in there? Anneke?"

Silence.

"Holly, can you turn the privacy function off?" he asked, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand.

"I can't do that!" the computer cried. "That would be amoral, depraved, and just downright cheeky. What if she's naked in there? I would be actively impugning my own honour!"

"Oh for God's sake, you insufferable prat!" Rimmer rubbed both hands through his hair, turning one way, then the other as he fretted. Giving it one last ditch attempt he called,

"Anneke, please answer me…" but received no response. "Oh, smeg it!"

With a deep, held breath he scrunched his eyelids closed, taking two long strides through the wall before him. Releasing the pressure in his chest he opened his eyes, his heart stopping.

"Oh my God…"

Falling to his knees he fought the wave of nausea that washed over him, hands trembling as he lifted them to his mouth. Anneke was lying prostrate on the floor, a puddle of water beside her, a red plastic cup perhaps two feet away where it had rolled along the lino. Bringing his ear close to her lips he could hear her take a strained breath, an unpleasant popping and crackling reverberating somewhere deep in her throat; she was still alive.

"Oh God, oh God, no no no…"

Reaching for her face, he hovered above her slick skin, aching to touch her, to do _something_. But he was helpless.

"Holly! HOLLY, YOU BASTARD!"

"Oi! That's not very nice, is it?" came the cockney drawl.

"You absolute idiot! You said she was awake!"

"No I didn't! I resent that! I never said she was awake! Just not asleep!"

Rimmer went to brush his hand over the halo of cream hair that was fanned out around the unconscious lieutenant, millimetres away, longing to feel it beneath his skin, unable to recall any time before now when he had been so utterly useless.

"Oh for smeg's sake, just get Kryten! NOW!"

Twenty minutes later Kryten was scooping Anneke off of the floor and into the decontamination shower, throwing the switch to the coldest setting, Rimmer following. The mechanoid carefully arranged the girl into the recovery position on the plastic floor, calling over the noise of the rushing water,

"We have to bring her temperature down! Stay with her, Mister Rimmer, I will fetch the gurney." He bustled out in a hurry, leaving Rimmer knelt beside her, the droplets of water slicing through him.

"Hold on, Anneke," he whispered, bowing his head. "Help is coming."

A flash of violet eyes, a flutter of lashes shining with jewels of water on the tips, a twitch of her head, low moan escaping her lips as quivering, wet, white fingers slid across the floor, reaching for his own insubstantial ones…

* * *

Anneke awoke to a cold rush of air on her face, her chest feeling as though someone had laid a pile of cinder blocks on it. Struggling to open her eyes, a sharp jab of pain shot through her head as they were flooded with light. Whimpering, she forced herself to raise one hand, every muscle screaming as she reached for the oxygen mask on her face.

"Don't do that, leave it on. Come on, leave it."

_Come on Anna, you've still got a brain in here. Engage it already._

Gradually things came into focus. She was looking up at a dirty white tile ceiling. Around her were the low beeps and whirs of medical machinery, as well as the purring of a motor and the buzz of a fan. Between her and the tiles that was a sheet of clear polythene plastic.

Fingers still resting on the mask she managed to turn her head to the right, peering at her surroundings. The plastic sheet fell in a neat oblong around her it seemed, held in place by aluminium poles. The noise of the generator was coming from an extraction fan with was connected to a long, canary yellow hose that fed out of the tent.

Next she managed to look down at herself. She was wrapped in a red woollen blanket with tiny square holes in it and the JMC insignia stamped on it in white. Her right hand was pierced with a cannula, a plastic strip of tape holding it in place, feeding back to a fluid cartridge beside the bed. She was dressed in a hospital gown of tissue paper. Again.

Finally she turned to the left, her fingers tightening on the silicone mask. Rimmer was sat there, in the tent, beside her bed, looking as thought he might fall to pieces at any moment.

"Good afternoon," he said tentatively, a deep crease in his brow.

She chuckled at that, then coughed, wincing as she did. Rimmer leant forwards in his chair, gripping the bottom like a vice.

"Hello," the girl managed after a few agonised breaths. "Where am I?"

"The medi-bay. You needed more help than the quarantine deck could afford you," Rimmer mumbled, looking down at his knees and shaking his head. "My God, Anneke, I am so, so sorry. I shouldn't have turned my back on you, I saw what a state you were in yesterday…"

"Don't. It's ok. You weren't to know," Anneke whispered. It was all she could manage. "Be straight with me here, Mister Rimmer; it isn't a cold is it?"

Slowly he looked up at her, a curled forelock slipping forwards. He must have run his hands through his hair a thousand times…

"No. It isn't."

She managed a cracked smile, pushing the blankets down to her hips. It was too hot.

"I thought not…" Looking up at him from the depths of her soft pillow she gave him what she hoped would be a comforting wink, saying,

"You know you're breaking all the rules being in here, don't you?"

"What do you me-" Rimmer paused, looking around himself at the quarantine tent before back at her. "Aah, yes. That. Well, I sort of thought it wouldn't really matter, what with me being little more than an expensive flashlight. Besides, I already broke them when I went into your quarters…"

He sniffed awkwardly, a faint hue of red colouring his cheeks. Anneke's smile widened and she shifted closer to the side of the bed nearest him, whispering as mischievously as she could manage,

"I won't tell if you don't."

He looked down at her with a grateful smile, relaxing a little as she settled back into the bed.

"Well," she said, brushing her damp hair away from her forehead, "what is it we're dealing with here then?"

Rimmer swallowed, jerking to sit up straighter and avoiding her gaze.

"That's not really my area of expertise," he said in a clipped tone. "You'd be better off speaking to Kryten or Holly or the medi-computer, I-"

"Arnold..."

_Damn! She did it again! Good grief man, how wet are you that a woman using your first name can have your metaphorical knees knocked out from under you?_

Slumping in his chair he looked down at her as steadily as he could. She looked so small, her skin almost the same colour as the bleached pillowcase beneath her, despite the raging inferno of a fever that was going on inside her.

"While you were out cold we did a chest x-ray. You have a severe respiratory infection, caused by this bastard virus" he said softly. "We're pumping you with as many antibiotics as we can. It's some sort of pneumonia, that's why you dropped, you were starved of oxygen. We're doing everything I can, I promise…"

Anneke closed her eyes, taking a few slow breaths of the cold air that was rushing through the mask as she absorbed this. She wasn't a doctor but she also wasn't stupid either. She'd heard about cases like this in history, epidemics in the twenty first century. Things hadn't turned out so well then.

"Anneke..?"

"I'm still here, don't worry."

Opening her eyes she looked up at Rimmer's stricken face, trying to resist the urge to cry. He was an inflated, insecure buffoon, yes, but he was her friend and he had been with her all the way.

"Look you," she said, reaching out so that her hand rested over his, a faint feeling of static tickling her skin as she came within atoms of his projection. "If things go wrong, it's ok, understand? I'll be alright with it. And I swear, I won't try to hijack your Light Bee." She forced a laugh, her companion looking down at her aghast. He went to say something but Anneke cut him off, pointing an index finger at him.

"Ah! I mean it. If it happens, it happens. I've already had three million years I shouldn't have."

Rimmer closed his mouth, an uncomfortable twitching in his chin and jaw. She smiled at him, the warmth of it reaching her eyes.

"By the way, I don't think I'll be much good at chess now," she said. The hologram shook his head, trying to make himself sound light;

"That's alright, I was rubbish at it anyway."

"Want to play the game?" the girl asked.

"What game?"

"You know. I'll start with an easy one. What was the last record you bought?"


End file.
